Review Platforms Google Trusts
E-ITA.org recovery audit · companion document · sources accessed 2026-09-30
Short answer. Keep the Trustpilot profile. Its terms keep the existing reviews (1,563 on 2026-09-22) publicly displayed on Trustpilot and on third-party services such as Google, whatever plan is chosen. Trustpilot is on Google's list of store rating partners.
- Trustpilot's paid plans start at $99 (Starter, for new small business customers only), $319 (Plus) and $799 (Premium) a month per domain, billed annually. Of these three, only Premium includes 1,000 invitations a month.
- The cheapest paid option with a Google store rating feed in this comparison is REVIEWS.io Start-Up: $79 a month at 1,000 orders a month, with up to 1,000 invitations compared with Starter's 100. Against a $99 baseline it saves $20 a month ($240 a year).
- Before copying the Trustpilot reviews to a new platform, get Trustpilot's written approval. Its terms bar collecting its content unless the terms permit it or Trustpilot authorises it.
1. What Google uses
Google bases store ratings (the stars shown in Google Ads and Shopping) on a number of sources, including three it lists on its store ratings help page (Google Ads Help, About store ratings):
The same page says “most merchants are able to obtain a rating after collecting 100 or more eligible reviews”, and stars show on text ads only with an “Average, composite, rating of 3.5 or more stars”. It lists 29 supported partners, including Trustpilot, Reviews.io, Yotpo, Feefo, Shopper Approved and Stamped.io. Judge.me is not on the list.
Trustpilot's help page adds three limits. Reviews “usually need to be from one of Trustpilot's verified invitation services to qualify”. Reviews from customers in a country count only toward the rating in that country. Google needs enough unique reviews from the last 5 years to calculate a rating, so the older reviews may not count (Trustpilot help, store ratings). The page names no plan restriction.
Two other Google routes do not fit E-ITA.org well:
- Google Business Profile reviews. The guidelines say “If your business either has a physical location that customers can visit, or travels to customers where they are, you can create a Business Profile on Google” (Business Profile guidelines). An online-only seller with no location customers can visit and no in-person service would not meet that test.
- Stars from the site's own review widget. Google's review snippet rules say “If the entity that's being reviewed controls the reviews about itself, their pages that use LocalBusiness or any other type of Organization structured data are ineligible for star review feature”. The same page says “Don't aggregate reviews or ratings from other websites” (Review snippet documentation). A widget builds trust on the page, but don't mark up Trustpilot ratings as the site's own review data. The stars Google shows come from the store rating route above.
Google Customer Reviews is a free program (Google Ads Help) offered in Merchant Center, with a badge that can be shown on the site (Merchant Center Help). Its integration guide asks for an opt-in module on the order confirmation page and, for every order, the order ID, email, delivery country and an estimated delivery date. It gives no guidance for goods that are not shipped (integration guide). Test it in Merchant Center before relying on it.
2. Platform comparison
Every figure below was read on the official page linked in its cell on 2026-09-30. “Not confirmed” means the official page did not publish the figure. Several vendors price by monthly order volume. E-ITA.org records about 30 orders a day, or about 900 a month, so figures are quoted at the 1,000-order tier where a vendor has one.
| Platform | Google store rating partner | Price and on-site widgets | Review invitations | Against a $99 baseline |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Trustpilot | Yes (Google) | Free: $0, 1 widget to collect reviews, no showcase widget listed. Starter: from $99 a month per domain, “Available only to new small business customers (up to $5M revenue)”, 2 widgets (1 to showcase trust). Plus: from $319, 10 widgets. Premium: from $799, 21 widgets, including testimonial widgets. Paid plans are a 12-month prepaid term, and the final quote depends on traffic, business size and revenue (Trustpilot pricing) | Free: 50 a month. Starter: 100. Plus: 300. Premium: 1,000 | Baseline (Starter) |
| REVIEWS.io | Yes, listed as Reviews.io (Google) | At 1,000 orders a month, in USD, month-to-month: Essentials $29, 15+ display widgets, no Google Seller Ratings. Start-Up $79, adds Google Seller Ratings and review importing. Grow $175. Plus $500. Prices scale with order volume, and a 20% annual discount is offered in the dashboard after signup (REVIEWS.io pricing) | At 1,000 orders a month: Essentials 300, Start-Up 1,000, Grow 1,000, Plus 7,500 | Start-Up saves $20 a month. Essentials is cheaper but gives no store rating |
| Yotpo | Yes (Google) | Priced by monthly order volume. At 1,000 orders a month: Starter $129, with on-site display. Pro $269, adds seller ratings. Monthly prices. A limited free plan covers up to 50 monthly orders (Yotpo pricing) | Limited by orders (1,000 a month at these tiers), not invitations | Starter costs $30 more and has no seller ratings. Pro costs $170 more |
| Feefo | Yes (Google) | Essentials: from £149 a month plus VAT, 10 on-site display widgets, “Google Seller Ratings, Google Shopping & Rich Snippets” (Feefo pricing) | Essentials 200 email invitations a month. Enhanced (from £299) 500 | Priced in pounds, from £149 plus VAT, so above $99 at any recent exchange rate |
| Stamped | Yes, listed as Stamped.io (Google) | Reviews from $199 a month, month-to-month, priced by order volume. “built for Shopify and Shopify Plus merchants”. Smaller self-serve plans sit in the Shopify App Store and are not priced on the page (Stamped pricing) | Not confirmed | Costs more at the listed $199 |
| Shopper Approved | Yes (Google) | Not confirmed. The pricing page publishes no figures, only a quote request and a 15-day trial (Shopper Approved pricing) | Not confirmed | Needs a quote |
| Judge.me | No (Google) | Free: $0, with review displays (reviews, ratings, carousels). Awesome: $15 a month. The plan list names Shopify features such as Shopify Flow. Its rich snippet markup on E-ITA.org's own pages would fall under the self-serving rule in section 1 (Judge.me pricing) | Unlimited review requests | Cheaper, but gives no store rating |
| Google Customer Reviews | Google's own program, one of the three store rating sources | Free (Google Ads Help). A site badge is available (Merchant Center Help) | Opt-in module on the order confirmation page (integration guide) | Free, if E-ITA.org's orders can supply the delivery-date field |
Google's list has 29 partners. Others, such as Okendo (built for Shopify brands, quote-based, with Google Seller Ratings sold as an add-on), were not priced because their public pages show no comparable figures (Okendo pricing).
3. Leaving Trustpilot versus keeping it
Trustpilot's terms settle the biggest question. Existing reviews stay up whatever E-ITA.org decides, unless Trustpilot or the reviewer removes them:
The terms cover display. They don't say whether the reviews keep counting toward a Google store rating after a plan ends, so confirm that with Trustpilot. The same terms bar businesses from collecting content outside Trustpilot's tools: “Access, search, or collect content from our platform or services by any means (automated or otherwise) except as permitted in these terms or otherwise authorised by us” (Trustpilot terms, version 9.0). REVIEWS.io advertises Trustpilot import, but Trustpilot's terms still bind E-ITA.org. Get Trustpilot's written approval before any import.
Keeping Trustpilot
- The reviews, the TrustScore and the history stay on the profile. Paid plans include widgets to show them on the site. The pricing page lists showcase widgets only on paid plans, so the Free plan does not display reviews on the site. Confirm this with Trustpilot.
- Starter is from $99 a month, Plus from $319 and Premium from $799, with the final quote set by traffic, size and revenue. The pricing page limits Starter to new small business customers, so ask Trustpilot which plans E-ITA.org is eligible for.
- The main limit is invitations: 50 a month on Free, 100 on Starter, 300 on Plus and 1,000 on Premium, against about 900 orders a month. Below Premium, that caps how fast new reviews arrive.
Moving to another partner (for example REVIEWS.io Start-Up)
- At $79 a month for E-ITA.org's volume, Start-Up allows up to 1,000 invitations a month and 15+ display widgets, with no 12-month term.
- Trustpilot paid plans renew automatically. Cancel by email at least 30 days before the term ends. There is no refund for the unused part of a prepaid term, so any saving starts at the next renewal. Renewals may rise by up to 5% without notice, or by another amount if Trustpilot gives 45 days' notice (Trustpilot terms).
- Reviews collected on the new platform start at zero there. Google builds the store rating from the reviews of all supported partners for the domain, so the existing Trustpilot reviews may keep counting toward it. Confirm with Trustpilot whether they do once invitations stop.
- The old Trustpilot profile stays public and, on the Free plan, can still send 50 invitations a month. Shoppers may still find it first when they search the brand name.
Lowest-cost combination
Keep the free Trustpilot profile live and answer its reviews. Collect new reviews on one listed partner, such as REVIEWS.io Start-Up. Test Google Customer Reviews in Merchant Center, since it is free and feeds the same store rating. Recheck Google's partner list and each vendor's price for E-ITA.org's real order volume before signing, because both change over time.